• Mediaweek, Monday, September 28, 2009 11:05 PM

Shelter magazine Dwell is crafting business partnerships with other independent magazines to keep costs down and the doors open. Dwell handles the back-office work for Afar, a just-launched travel title. Now it's taken on U.S. sales and marketing duties for Trends, a New Zealand-based publisher of home design and remodeling titles.

Dwell is identifying potential partners through distributor Time/Warner Retail Sales & Marketing and its printer and paper supplier, says publisher Michela O'Connor Abrams. "The motivation is about this continued ridiculous increase in the cost of goods," she says. Abrams says the arrangements help Dwell and its partners by increasing their bargaining power with vendors and advertisers and allowing the magazines to share best practices.

Since its beginnings in 2000, Dwell has expanded to include a home furnishings show and line of Dwell-branded homes, designed to offset ad-page softness during the housing market collapse. Its newest additions are special-interest, newsstand-only titles that publish twice annually and carry a $10 cover price.

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